Agriculture News
Milo and Otis
During the last week of Term 3 Brett from GV Vets visited the College to perform a procedure on our two calves, Milo and Otis.
The Year 10 and 11 Agriculture students observed. Brett spoke to the students about what he was going to do and what the students would see. The calves were given a general anaesthetic and then local anaesthetic around their horn buds. Brett used a hot iron to burn off the horn buds so they do not grow into horns. The calves were then given more local anaesthetic in front of the scrotum and some long acting pain relief.
Well done to Chris and Atiqullah for applying the rubber ring to the scrotums.
The calves were asleep for a couple of hours, waking up to a large bottle of milk at 1pm.
Shepparton Show
Agriculture students had great success at the Shepparton Show this year.
Year 11 VCE Ag Hort students dominated the Home Produce section in Horticulture with results as follows:
Riley Stagg: 1st place Six Broad Beans
Gabriella Sinclair and Rylie Bentley: 2nd place Six Broad Beans
Bronte McMahon and Atiqullah Akbari – 1st place Three Carrots, leaves on.
Bronte McMahon and Kaileigh Wilhelms – 1st place, One Lettuce, any variety.
Denzel Kazayi – 2nd place, One Lettuce, any variety.
Gabriella Sinclair and Rylie Bentley – 2nd place Bunch of Silverbeet – 5 stalks in water.
Year 10 Agriculture and Year 11 VCE Ag Hort students were very successful in both the Eggs section and the Dairy Cattle handling and Goat exhibiting and handling:
Eggs:
Brad Handley: 1st place Half Dozen White Eggs (thanks to Belinda the chook)
Jagamahra Weston (prepared by Chris Brown): 2nd place Half Dozen Brown Eggs (thanks to Rita the chook).
Dairy Cattle Handling:
The following students participated in a Dairy Cattle Handling clinic on Thursday afternoon, the day before the show. The students learned how to parade and stand a heifer in the ring and present her correctly for the judge. They learned how to keep an eye on the judge all the time as well as an eye on their own animal and animals around them. Well done to the following students who participated in the clinic:
Jodie Handley, Breeanna Bell, Jackson Brierley, Amber McCauley, Myah Huddle and Chelsea Kelly.
On the Friday evening at the Youth Show, the students competed in the Handler classes with the following results:
1st place: Jodie Handley
2nd place: Amber McCauley with ‘Sandmade’
3rd place: Jackson Brierley
4th place: Chelsea Kelly
6th place: Myah Huddle with ‘Hannah’
Jodie was very involved with the dairy section in general, handling and exhibiting several animals for their owners throughout the show.
Goats:
Kaileigh Wilhelms and Jackson Barter assisted the exhibitors with the Dairy Goats. Amber McCauley and Phoebe Wheeler (Year 7) assisted with the Boar Goats. The students handled many goats, standing them and parading them for the judges in a number of classes.
In the Dairy Goat handling class Kaileigh was placed 1st and Jackson was placed 2nd.
In the Boar Goat handling class Amber and Phoebe were placed equal 1st, Amber presenting ‘Midnight’.
Year 10 Agriculture – Wool Classing
Week 1 of this term commenced with a unit of work on wool classing. An ultrafine Saxon merino fleece from Mrs. Drinnan’s FibreFine Merinos was brought into the classroom where students each removed the short, matted and stained edges of the fleece (skirting). The students then carefully rolled up the fleece and tested a staple of wool for staple strength using the ‘finger flick’ method. The fleece will now be entered in the Euroa Show fleece competition for the students.
A second activity involved recognising 18 different samples of wool from Merino, Cheviot, Southdown, Corriedale and various crosses of those breeds. The samples included fleece wool, bellies, pieces, weaner wool, stain, wigs and locks. Students learned to look at the features of each type of wool including length, colour, crimp, handle, style and tip.
Students then used the AWEX Bale Description chart to form the bale descriptions for each sample.
Soil Week Australia competition
For the third successive year, GSSC students have been successful in the Soil Week Australia ‘Healthy Soil Healthy Food’ competition. Several students from the Semester 1 ‘Sense of Humus’ class were shortlisted for the major prizes. With a lot of entries and a very high standard across the Year 9/10 category, the following students did exceptionally well with their entries, receiving a SHOUT OUT prize of a $50 gift voucher to celebrate their efforts:- Asra Ieddi and Raghad Al-Mohamad for their PowerPoint- Brodie Moon for his children’s story book, “The Farmer Who Hates Dirt”- Sophie McCrae for her animated movie, - Yasameen Al-Amin for her PowerPoint.
I would like to also make mention of the efforts of Indi Stewart-Lovell and Kirby Maidment who made a joint PowerPoint and to Abdur Hossain for his very creative PowerPoint.
Year 8 student, Riley Wooster, received 2nd place in the Year 7/8 category, winning a $100 JB-HIFI card.
Congratulations to all students!